Wednesday, December 30, 2015

2016

My latest @ National Review
President Obama's 2015 Foreign Policy Disasters Pave the Way for 3 New Crises in 2016

Note, this quote: ''While Iran has been bloodied by the Syrian conflict, it’s Baghdad, and not Damascus, that is the center of gravity in the regional power struggle.'' should be read in the context of my recent piece on Iranian actions in Iraq. My links on other foreign policy issues can be seen under the foreign policy header of my bio.
National Review Online

Monday, December 28, 2015

*How Islamic State Covert Action Teams are Plotting Major Attacks in Europe

* I pitched this piece to 3/4 outlets on November 1st (12 days before ISIS attacked Paris). No one accepted. For me, that makes this pitch a good example of the challenge that freelance pitches entail. The Editor has a lot of pitches in front of him/her and a finite amount of time. Some important pieces - such as this one - inevitably fall through the cracks.

“Fewer than 50” Special Operators will deploy to Syria to fight the Islamic State. This is vintage Obama national security strategy:  “fewer than 50” represents a number calibrated to avoid liberal disquiet, and even enough for a pretense of strategic viability. Still, while the deployment-strength obviously isn’t ideal, the 2001 US campaign in Afghanistan shows what a few talented professionals can do with maps, radios, mobility and friendly aircraft overhead. Who knows, hopefully IS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi will be al-Zarqawi-d by the year’s end.

Unfortunately the Islamic State isn’t sitting idle. As the US sends its operators onto IS home turf, the Islamic State is reciprocating in much greater measure.

As I noted in May 2014, IS ideology and its western recruitment has always posed serious danger. Yet last November, IS prioritized international attacks and it now poses an unprecedented threat. Take the UK. Speaking last week, the Director of MI5 (Britain’s domestic intelligence service) noted that 5 and its partners had “thwarted six attempts at terrorist attacks in the UK in the last year, and several plots overseas.  He added, “We are seeing plots against the UK directed by terrorists in Syria” and “greater ambition for mass casualty attacks.” But what really concerns MI5 is overstretch. That’s because at present, MI5 personnel are greatly stretched by their human surveillance taskings: they have limited numbers of surveillance officers to deploy and many jihadist returners from Syria (plus other terrorist suspects) to monitor. In addition, IS has improved its training to help its covert agents avoid capture. To make matters worse, some young Muslim men remain profoundly skeptical of the British government and open to radicalization.

France faces a similar threat. Consider the recent report  by French newspaper, Le Monde, on a government document that shows the Fifth Republic’s challenge in grappling with IS fighters who have returned to commit atrocities.  Noting an interviewed suspect’s description of Syria as a terrorist “factory”, the document also explains the resource and assessment challenge in prioritizing high-threat ‘returners’ for surveillance. Most ominously, the report claims IS has told its European recruits to travel to EU states other than their own. Relying on open inter-EU border rules, IS hopes a terrorist who is known by his home nation will be unknown to a foreign intelligence service. As such, intelligence cooperation-trust on counter-terrorism issues has never been so crucial*. Then there’s Germany. Today, concerned that Chancellor Merkel’s open doors immigration policy endangers national security, the Germany intelligence community appears to be leaking information against that policy. Aware that IS perceives human refugees as a useful cover for large scale infiltration into Europe, German intelligence fears that attackers might have already entered their country and activated attack plans.

Of course, some will read this and say that its scaremongering. Others will point to terrorist casualty statistics and say that the risks are exaggerated. But these arguments fail to account for terrorism’s ultimate target: the human soul. After all, while an attack might kill relatively few people, its second and third-order impact on public confidence, the economy, and society are profound. Anyone in London on July 21st 2005 – when, just two weeks after the July 7th terrorist attacks, bombers attempted four more bombings– can attest to this truth. And as we’ve seen in IS propaganda videos, al-Baghdadi’s hordes take special pleasure in their conscious fetishism of human misery. Pursuant to its total-war project to purify the earth under a unified caliphate, IS desperately wants to claim the throne of global Salafi-Jihadism from al-Qaeda.

In short, the Islamic State threat is real, and it is growing. We desperately need a new strategy to defeat IS (here’s mine). Again, the numbers tell the tale of seriousness. We’re sending 50 Special Operators into Syria, and the Islamic State is mobilizing thousands

*- … As I noted last year, the intelligence relationship issue is one reason why the Senate’s CIA sham report was so pathetic.



Saturday, December 26, 2015

The McLaughlin Group - 2015 AWARDS SHOW pt. 1

My time linked comments:
BIGGEST WINNER: Ayatollah Khamenei 
BEST POLITICIAN: David Cameron
WORST POLITICIAN: Bill De Blasio
MOST DEFINING POLITICAL MOMENT: The Paris attacks
TURNCOAT OF THE YEAR: Donald Trump
MOST CHARISMATIC: Marco Rubio
BUMMEST RAP: Jeb Bush
MOST ORIGINAL THINKER: Biden for his speech at White House
MOST STAGNANT THINKER: Bernie Sanders (followed by a discussion on Heston)
BEST PHOTO OP (most powerful): The dead Syrian boy on the Turkish beach
CAPITALIST OF THE YEAR: Pope Francis
HONORABLE MENTION: Joe Dunford and Ash Carter

Friday, December 25, 2015

Friday, November 27, 2015

Fox News

On Special Report panel: Discussing Intelligence Management by the Obama Administration (I speak at 3m34s). We also discussed the refugee crisis - still looking for a video link on that one!
Image result for fox news

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Russia Writings

Here are my collected thoughts on Russia. More TV related comments can be found here.


Page is constantly updated.
President Obama at the UN - National Review
Russia can be deterred in Syria - National Review
Speech on Russia/Ukraine - Steamboat Institute
MH-17 and the Downing of US Leadership - National Review
How to confront Putin - McLaughlin Group
Putin Returns - National Review
US policy in Ukraine - McLaughlin Group
The Nemtsov Murder - National Review
Debaltseve - McLaughlin Group
Honesty on Ukraine - National Review
Russia's War on Fracking - National Review
Putin, the Hungry Bear - National Review
Why Russia has re-invaded Ukraine - National Review
NATO in crisis - Daily Telegraph
Ukraine situation - Fox News
Ukraine Snap Election: What this means for the conflict - Daily Telegraph
Ukraine and the division of strategic purpose - The Spectator
Discussing Ukraine crisis - Fox News
MH17 makes the situation in Ukraine an American crisis and EU catastrophe - The Spectator
What to do after MH17 - National Review
Obama Doctrine/Delusion - National Review
Obama's Sanctions Elixir - National Review
The Demise of the U.N. - National Review
Why Ukraine vindicates the NSA - American Spectator
The Nuland Call - National Review
Globe in Partes Tres - National Review

My work has been recommended by the UK Parliament, the American Enterprise Institute, the BBC, +BBC +BBC, the Council on Foreign Relations, CNN’s Fareed Zakaria, the Foreign Policy Initiative, The Week magazine, The Wire + The Wire + The Wire + The Wire, the Center on National Security at Fordham Law School, and Real World Politics/Real Clear Politics. My examination of US security challenges at the end of 2013 was reviewed as the global ‘‘must read’’ of the day by the BBC.

ISIS and American - Two Very Different Banners

Sunday, November 15, 2015

Islamic State - Warning about Paris-style IS attacks (and links to pieces on evolving threats to west)

I've been warning for a while that IS attacks on Europe/west were very likely. These articles - in chronological order (MOST RECENT ARTICLES AT END OF THIS PAGE) - include pieces post-Paris that offer my (hopefully) original thoughts on Daesh strategy.



Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's Global Jihad - November 2014 - National Review

UK domestic terrorist threat/societal challenges - November 2014 - National Review

Why the Belgium Terrorist Attacks are Noteworthy - January 2015 - National Review

On foreign policy failures under President Obama - January 2015 - McLaughlin Group

On the 'returner' threat to US/UK - January 2015 - McLaughlin Group

Why the Islamic State will attack America - March 2015 - National Review

How to Defeat ISIS - June 2015 - National Review

The state of the Islamic State: Strong - October 2015 - National Review

How ISIS Covert Action Teams are Plotting Major Attacks in Europe - 12 Days before Paris attacks - Homepage

ISIS = Special Threat to the West -  November 2015 (post-Paris) - National Review

2 Takeaways from Brussels - March 2016 - National Review

How Britain is Preventing ISIS Attacks - March 2016 -  National Review

5 Takeaways on the Dusseldorf Plot - June 2016 - National Review (Putting this here because it basically proves all of the above)

Terror in Nice - July 2016 - (National Review)

ISIS Total War Strategy - July 2016 - (National Review)

ISIS Remains Strong - October 2016 - (National Review)

How Daesh Poses a Serious Threat to Europe - December 2016 - (Weekly Standard)

3 Reasons Germany is in Daesh's Reticle - December 2016 - (National Review)

Also relevant are my collected writings on the Middle East and on Homegrown Terrorism
Image result for franceImage result for france USA